Resources

Cook Books I Use

This is an absolutely fabulous book, even if you are not a vegetarian! Each page is a new recipe and every recipe has pictures of the finished product
as well as the preparation process. Plus it has the break down of the nutritional information! Best.Cookbook.Ever!

This was one of the first cookbooks that I ever bought. I got it in a set with the Better Homes and Garden New Cook Book and The Pilsbury Cookbook, but I find that I use the Fannie Farmer far
more often than the other two. In fact, I have used it so much that it is now in two halves with some loose pages shoved in the middle. One of the things that I really like about this book is
that it has conversion tables, plus it covers cooking and baking basics. And there is a canning section!!

This book is the ultimate bread book. It explains not only how to bake bread using the bread machine, it explains the whole process of making various breads.
It covers various ingredients and the effect that they have on the bread. It even explains how to create your own starters! There are beautiful pictures with step-by-step visuals on how to make each bread.
Plus it has a recipe for just about every variety of bread that you may ever want to bake; and they have all been fabulous recipes!

Monday, January 4, 2010

I wanted to add some more appetizers to my repertoire, so when I found a recipe for Tunisian Brik in my appetizer cookbook ("Appetizers, Finger Food, Buffet & Parties", by Bridget Jones) I had to try making it. I did make a few small changes - of course. The following is what I came up with.

3 TBS butter, melted

1 small red onion, finely chopped

1 lb ground turkey

1 garlic clove, minced

1 TBS lemon juice

2 TBS finely chopped cilantro

1-2 eggs, scrambled

phyllo dough

Start by mixing everything but the egg and phyllo dough in a frying pan and cook until meat is thoroughly cooked. Then it is on to phyllo dough!

Let me start by saying that phyllo dough is a mother to work with! It is very thin, tears easily, dries out quickly, and then crumbles. I kept a mister handy to keep the dough moist; but be careful! If you get the dough too moist, it sticks to everything!

I laid out two sheets. the recipe called for brushing with melted butter, but due to the delicacy of these sheets, I sprayed them with Pam instead.

The sheets were rather large, so I cut them into sixths.

Then I folded each of the pieces until they made 3"x3" squares.

They don't need to be perfectly even. As you can see, some parts have more layers than others.

Place a tablespoon of the meat filling in the center of each square and a teaspoon of egg over that.

Fold the phyllo corner to corner and seal with a little water. Place the triangles on a greased/oiled baking sheet and drizzle with olive oil.

Bake at 425F for 8-10 minutes. They should be golden brown.

These were AWESOME! And once you get the hang of handling the phyllo dough, they are amazingly easy to make!